


tiny flowers

by belby



Category: Ant-Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: F/M, and cassies like his weird bug nerd cousin, and peters a pining mess !, anyway!, like everyone is still alive and happy ok, peter goes to his weird second family for advice, rlly this is just an excuse to write hope and scott as like quirky aunt and uncle figures for peter, scott and hope are disgustingly in love, thats it thats the fic, this is post endgame bc cassie is 15 but it also ignores endgame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-10 21:27:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18668710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belby/pseuds/belby
Summary: Now, Scott claps his hands together, remembering why Peter had burst through his door. “Girl advice,” he says. And then he’s grinning, wiping the sweat from his forehead. “That’s right. 'Course you'd come to me for that. Because you know I must have done something right to...you know...” He nods at a picture frame sat on a shelf near Peter, of Scott and Hope together, and then keeps nodding, looking proud of himself. “I don’t know what I did exactly, but it must’ve been right.”Or, Peter is, like, really in love with MJ, and goes to Scott for advice.





	tiny flowers

**Author's Note:**

> this is rlly just a dumb self-indulgent fic with no real purpose to it other than to have these characters talk to each other. 
> 
> (also, i know scott doesn't live in a tiny apartment but...it felt Right.)  
> (also also teenage cassie will probably 100% not be characterised like this if we see more of her in the mcu but. i want her to be weird. my weird bug girl)
> 
> i wrote this in just a couple hours today so pls bear w me.

Peter has decided that one day Scott Lang will die of heat stroke in his own apartment.

It’s not summer yet, but thanks to humanity’s knack for destroying the planet, this particular spring day feels like it might as well be. And Peter sits on a box on the floor that’s serving as a chair, watches Scott fix Cassie’s bike on the coffee table, and sweats buckets through his t-shirt.

The windows of Scott’s fourth storey apartment are pulled open behind them, letting in a breeze that does little else but tickle the faded white curtains and brush weakly against the sweat on Peter’s neck. The tiny lounge-room has seemed to breathed all of the day’s heat, so the air is stuffy and hot and tinged with the sun’s gold hues. Scott has sweat dripping down his forearms. His air conditioner stopped working about a month ago and he and Peter had only broken it worse when they tried to fix it.

“Does this look right?” Scott asks, leaning back on his heels to inspect the bike with a frown.

Peter narrows his eyes at the bike, it’s green and black and objectively ugly, but that’s what makes it Cassie’s. “It just looks like a bike,” he replies.

“I mean, you’re right,” Scott says. “But the gears definitely look better.” Then he does a double take, looking at Peter, as though he only just remembered that Peter was there. Which, is probably true. Peter has been sitting here silently watching Scott work for over ten minutes. “Wait, you came here for something.”

Peter’s face reddens, and he must look like a tomato, considering how red the heat had made his face before. He _had_ come here for something, advice actually, but now that he’s had ten-minutes of silence to dwell on it, he realises that the whole thing is pretty stupid. “It’s – uh, don’t worry about it. I can help with the bike – ”

Ever since joining the Avengers, Peter has found himself suddenly surrounded by adults who are all more than happy to take him under his wing. (Carol Danvers had once ruffled his hair and said, “let me know if you ever need a guide around space, kid,” and Peter is still processing it to this day). But, more and more, Peter has found himself gravitating toward Scott when it comes to asking advice for things that aren’t superhero related. School trouble, ‘what-am-I-going-to-do-with-my-future trouble’, relationship trouble, Peter is turning up at Scott’s door looking for someone to talk to. And maybe it’s because Scott is funny and easy to have a conversation with, or because Scott is so _normal_ compared to the majority of their ‘co-workers’, with a tiny apartment and an oddball daughter, but Peter has now become so close to him that neither he nor Scott had been phased when Scott had once accidentally introduced Peter to his friend as his nephew.

Now, Scott claps his hands together, remembering why Peter had burst through his door. “Girl advice,” he says. And then he’s grinning, wiping the sweat from his forehead. “That’s right. ‘Course you’d come to me for that. Because you know I must have done something right to...you know...” He nods at a picture frame sat on a shelf near Peter, of Scott and Hope together, and then keeps nodding, looking proud of himself. “I don’t know what I did exactly, but it must’ve been right.”

Peter nods, fidgets, then shoves his hands between his knees to stop fidgeting. “I – uh, just want to know, how to ask her out, because I…well I really like her and I think she likes me too, but I don’t know…like. What to say.”

“I don’t think Scott’s the right person to ask.” And then Hope is entering the room from the kitchen, holding a beautifully made sandwich on a plate, and an amused smile on her face. She carefully seats herself on the couch behind Scott, trying not to disturb her sandwich, and leans toward Peter. “Just between you and me,” she fake-whispers, well aware Scott can hear her. “But Scott never asked me out.”

Peter always feel a little intimidated whenever he’s around Hope, only because he used to look up to her so much. Can remember the nights he’d spend holed up in his room, devouring her research papers, reading articles on the Pym Particles. With her eyes on him now, a small playful grin at the corners of her mouth, Peter feels the sudden urge to say something very smart.

Instead, he feels himself go even redder.

“Now hang on – ” Scott starts.

“I had to initiate everything, you know that, babe, you’re hopeless.”

“Well that last thing might be true but I swear – ” Scott thinks it over, and it seems Hope is right, because when he glances back at Hope, who raises her eyebrows gleefully at him, he makes a small, flustered sound and then goes back to working on the bike. “I know one thing I initiate,” he mumbles and Hope playfully pretends to kick her bare foot at Scott’s head. He grabs it, when her foot appears by his ear, catching her by surprise. And she does some sort of shriek-laugh when he pretends to bike her ankle.

It doesn’t sound like her at all; Hope, who is so put together, quick wit, sharp brain, pointed smiles. This is a messier sort of Hope, less contained, wearing a large shirt that’s probably Scott’s, her hair tied up without much thought, letting her laughter fill the room. And it really should make her seem less intimidating. With her sharp edges softened and her shoulders loose. But this messier sort of Hope lets her emotions spill out of her, until she seems to glow with a golden type of happiness, until her eyes are the brightest thing in the room, and it makes her, in Peter’s opinion, look like some type of sun goddess.

So he goes somehow goes even  _more_ red. And Scott presses a kiss to Hope’s ankle before letting her foot go. And she gently prods her toes against the back of his head with another messy laugh. And Peter _would_ feel weird, seeing his, in effect, his aunt and uncle, flirt right in front of him, but mostly he feels a little jealous. Or envious, that might be it. He wants what they have. Not right now, because he’s an awkward, still-figuring-it-out-teen, but in the future, when he has his life together. He wants a cramped apartment where he and his partner walk around bare foot and hot and sweaty to the point where it’s almost gross, but not care. Where they can leave the windows open to breathe in the smell of spring and flirt in the hotbox lounge-room and be comfortable and complete and with each other.

Where they can be the messy sort of versions of themselves, the versions that laugh so loud and bright it turns the whole room gold.

He feels envious because he doesn’t think he’ll ever have that. Because the future feels so uncertain and far away. Because in his mind this future partner is MJ, (but Peter would never tell a soul that he fantasises about a future domestic life with her, even Cassie would tease him about that) and he can’t have this future with her if he can’t _fucking ask her out._

“Please help,” he pleads.

Hope pulls her foot back and squares her shoulders, though she fails at trying to squeezing into a business-like Hope, all those golden emotions are too large to fit. Scott, however, settles into a more serious expression, his ‘Uncle Scott’ expression.

“Look, kid,” he says. “This girl you like, MJ? She sounds awesome. If you wanna ask her out, just go for it. Ask her to a movie and hold her hand over the armrest, go for the old stretching-an-arm-out-like-you’re-yawning-but-really-you’re-putting-it-over-her-shoulder trick, if that’s what kids still do these days – ”

“But what if she says no?” Peter interrupts, miserable at even the thought. “And then things become awkward between us? Or she doesn’t wanna talk to me at all anymore because it’s weird? I still wanna be her friend – I don’t wanna ruin that.”

“Pfft, like I said, MJ sounds _awesome,”_ Scott says, waving a hand dismissively. “Things might be a little awkward but you guys are good friends, and I don’t think she’s the type to cold-shoulder you for asking her out.”

“She’s not,” Peter agrees, but that doesn’t stop him from thinking of the worst case scenario. Like what if while asking her out he says something dumb or fucks it up in a way that’ll make her never want to talk to him again?

He remembers, once, they had been studying together in the library, and the weather had been cold so she’d been wearing this white, almost fluffy, cotton sweater. And her nose had been tinged red from the brisk walk outside. And as she leant over to study a paragraph in the book she was reading, her hair – which was down and curling prettily around her face – had fallen over her eye, so she’d tucked it softly behind her ear.

And Peter, who had been watching her the whole time, had felt so overwhelmingly attracted to her at that moment, that something in his brain malfunctioned, and he blurted, “I literally don’t need to study, I got an A on our last chemistry test just by winging it.”

And MJ had looked absolutely dumbfounded. Which, of course, made sense, because that had come absolutely out of _fuck-all nowhere_ , and had made Peter sound like a _Flash-Thompson type asshole._

“That’s weird,” MJ had said.

Peter felt like he was going to spontaneously combust, he was so embarrassed. Why, on _earth,_ did any part of him think he could impress her by boasting about something that wasn’t even true? “I don’t know why I said that,” he said dumbly.  

“Especially since I’ve seen you study,” MJ said, “many times.”

“Because I do,” Peter said. “I didn’t even get an A on that test.”

“Like I said,” MJ said, but she seemed amused, “weird.”  

And well, what if Peter does something like _that_ again?

“But,” Peter begins now.

“Peter,” Hope says, gently. “The worst case scenario is that it’ll be awkward for maybe a day or two. Best case is, you’ll get to date the girl you really like. Don’t overthink it.”

“Go for it, kid,” Scott says. “Ask her to a movie, and if you fuck it up, you come over here and watch a movie with us instead. I have ice-cream to cry into in the freezer.”

“But he’s not going to mess it up,” Hope says, and her tone is pointed enough that Scott seems to understand that she’s giving him a stern look without even looking at her face.

“Oh, yeah, right, yeah, he won’t mess it up. You won’t mess it up,” Scott says. “But that ice-cream will be there.”

“Okay,” says Peter, letting out a nervous breath. Hope gives him an encouraging smile. “I’ll try.”

“Hell yeah you will,” Scott says.

Peter gets up, his legs shaky. No time like the present then.

“Wait,” Scott says, scrambling to his feet so fast he almost the bike over. “I’ve got something for you.”

He disappears into his room. Peter and Hope exchange confused looks. When Scott returns he holds out something small and colourful in his hands, gesturing for Peter to take it.

It’s a tiny vase of flowers.

“Are those real?” Peter asks.

“Yeah, Hope got us a bunch of flowers and nice stuff to try and lighten up this place and Cassie and I shrunk some down because, well, that’s just what do.” He gestures again for Peter to take it. It feels so delicate between Peter’s fingers. “Give it to your girl. It’ll be, like, both cute and funny. Double whammy.” Then he looks over at Hope. “Not bad, eh?”

“I can’t believe you did that to my flowers,” she says.  

Peter can tell she’s just messing with him, but Scott’s expression drops into something apologetic. He slides past them, toward the front door, as Scott rambles out an apology.

“Hey,” Hope calls out, stopping Peter as he opens the door. “Good luck.”

“Oh, yeah,” Scott says, distracted from his own apology. “We’re rooting for you, kid.”

Peter smiles. “Thanks, guys,” he says, and slips out the door.

 

 

* * *

 

 

As Peter leaves the apartment and makes his way down the hall to the elevator, he bumps into a girl carrying a glass box full of dirt.

“Hey, Cassie,” he says.

Fifteen year old Cassie Lang, who had been peering through the glass top of the box, startles up to look at him.

“Whatcha got there?” Peter asks, gesturing at the box.

As he asks that, they both look at the box. And as Cassie answers, Peter sees the dirt shift, and something small and dark climb up against the glass.

“Bullet ants,” Cassie replies.

Peter takes a large step back.

“They have one of the most painful bites in the world,” Cassie continues, looking as fond and proud as someone might if they had told Peter they had just taught their small puppy how to sit.

“I know.” Peter’s voice goes up an octave. “Um, why do you have them?”

“Because they’re cool,” Cassie says, which is just about the answer Peter was expecting.

Cassie Lang is about as weird as Hope is smart, or MJ is pretty and smart and funny and… – and, anyway, Peter likes spending time with her more than he does with about ninety eight percent of people.

She is obsessed with bugs, which makes sense, considering who her dad and his girlfriend are, but she is also into all things weird and abstract and odd and gross. Hanging out with her means learning a bunch of cool new bug facts, and hearing stories of botched surgeries you didn’t want to hear, and conspiring about what alien probing really entails.

“Did you just see my dad?” Cassie asks. She points at Peter's hand. "Ha. Tiny flowers." 

“Yeah.” Peter gives her a small smile, but shifts uncomfortably. “I was asking for advice, y’know, about asking MJ out.”

For the past couple of weeks, Cassie has been Peter’s go-to for all things griping and pining and moaning over his crush on MJ. He had called her just last night to groan about how much he wished he could just toughen up and ask MJ on a date, and Cassie had listened attentively, as she always does, and then accidentally hung up on him, because for some reason she has never quite gotten the hang of smart phones.

Cassie is not very good at advice, but she doesn’t judge, which Peter appreciates.

“So are you gonna do it? Ask her out?” Cassie asks.

“I think so.”

“Hm.” Cassie looks very thoughtful for a moment, staring down at her box of ants. She goes quiet for a long enough time that Peter begins to feel a little uneasy. Though Cassie has a habit of getting lost in her head a lot – Peter supposes it’s because there’s a lot of interesting stuff in there – so this isn’t exactly a rare occurrence, he can’t help but worry that maybe she’s beginning to have doubts about the whole MJ thing.

But finally Cassie looks back up at Peter and says, “I wonder what MJ’s favourite kind of beetle is.”

Peter blinks. “I don’t think she has one.”

“I’ll have to ask her,” Cassie continues, like Peter hadn’t spoken. “I’ll message her on Facebook.”

“Wait – you have _Facebook?”_ Peter had once tried to sign her up for Twitter so she could understand some of the memes he always referenced, and Cassie had tweeted ‘Hi Peter’ like she thought it was some sort of messaging app, before giving up because she didn’t understand it. “And, wait – _you’re friends with MJ on Facebook?”_

Cassie and MJ have never met, and only know each other through what Peter has told them about each other.

“Yeah.” Cassie shrugs. “Big deal.”

“Uh, yeah, big deal!” Peter’s voice rises another few octaves again, he can feel himself going red. “What if – what – have you- what have you been telling her?”

“How much you wanna kiss her,” Cassie replies plainly. Peter feels his entire body lock up, his attempt at a reply coming out as only a high-pitched squeak. “But not really,” Cassie adds, seeing that Peter is about two seconds from collapsing. “We just talk about cool stuff. Sometimes she asks what you’re up to, but that’s it.”

“She…asks about me?”

“Yeah, not as much as she asks about ant colonies though. But she seems pretty interested. In your life and the colonies.” Cassie pauses. “MJ’s so cool.”

 _MJ asks about him!_ _She’s interested in his life!!! She really could actually like him! She really could actually like him!!!!!!_

“Wow,” says Peter. “Wow, that’s. That’s. I mean.” He laughs, feeling giddy and warm and fuzzy and suddenly so full energy that he needs to jump off a building and swing it off. “That’s wow.”

Cassie pokes her finger at an ant climbing up the inside of the glass, distracted.

“Thanks, Cassie,” Peter says.

“Oh.” Cassie glances at him, not sure what he’s thanking her for. Peter’s not sure either, really. But he feels as messy-happy as Hope had looked, and it’s because of what Cassie had said, so. “Yeah. Okay. Hey, was Hope home?”

“Yeah.”

Cassie’s face lights up. “Awesome.” Then she’s rushing past him without so much as a goodbye – but that’s typical for Cassie. Peter rushes too, toward the elevator, taken over by a new surge of confidence. He’s gonna ask MJ out. He’s gonna go for it.

“Hey!” Cassie calls back, just as Peter is stepping into the elevator. “Good luck!”

And then Cassie kicks the apartment door open and Peter can hear her announce her arrival with an excited, “Bullet ants!” followed by a panicked, _“Peanut!”_ from Scott.

Peter laughs as the elevator doors slide closed. The tiny vase of flowers held carefully between his fingers. Still sweating from Scott’s apartment. Full of the confidence he needed. Messy-happy.

**Author's Note:**

> every time peter is enamoured by hope in this he's not peter he's my self-insert.
> 
>  
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/spideychelle)


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